


First kisses, last chances

by Korrigan131



Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-23
Updated: 2020-11-23
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:00:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27682579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Korrigan131/pseuds/Korrigan131
Summary: If you're so obvious that the whole word thinks you're together, then there's no point trying to do anything about it after so long, because it's clearly not reciprocated.Ferrari drops Felipe for 2013. Rob finds out from the press release.
Relationships: Felipe Massa/Rob Smedley
Comments: 6
Kudos: 7





	First kisses, last chances

**Author's Note:**

> Clearing out my WIPs. No idea why I didn't post this at the time, as it looked finished?? Who knows.
> 
> This was written in mid 2012, pre-Japan, pre-Felipe re-signing for 2013, and apparently back when Kovalainen to Ferrari was apparently a viable rumour...

No-one would believe them if they said they weren’t together, so they don’t bother to deny it. The world _knows_ they are, so despite the irony that they aren't, they let the world think what it will.

Because you know he doesn’t like you that way. You’ve been around each other for so long, the world knows you like him, so surely _he_ knows? And he’s never said anything, not in all this time, so that’s pretty clear then that he doesn’t like you the ways you like him. But it’s ok. Having him as a friend is enough, and he’ll always be your friend. And his friendship is too precious to risk like that.

That’s what they both tell themselves anyway. 

Possibly, if the world knew they weren’t, then someone would give them the final push. But no-one does. Because they already are. Apparently. Always have been, always will be.

And then, it was over. _Always_ wouldn’t be always.

Ferrari announce that Kovaleinen will take the second seat in 2013. Felipe finds out before it’s announced, via his agent, of course.

The first Rob hears is the press release.

His first thought isn’t coherent - it’s a feeling, a cold, leaden kick in the stomach, a sudden, paralysing _grief_.

His second thought isn’t coherent either - it’s a sound, of sympathy and concern, “ _oh_ ”, a vocalisation of the need to bundle his driver into his arms, hold him tight, and make it all ok somehow.

His third thought _is_ coherent, and it’s different from all the others. It’s a sentence - _“Why didn’t he tell me?”_ It’s disappointment and a strange form of anger, that he knows his driver doesn’t deserve, but the thought still hurts Rob.

So he doesn’t call him, or text him, or try to find him. He didn’t want him to know. So... And when they see each other next, it’s just another day. Rob says nothing; conflicted, confused, upset and uncertain.

Felipe says nothing either. Rob can tell he’s not ok, but...

When they leave the garage, Felipe goes his way, and Rob goes his. As normal. But Rob’s not like this, he’s always been the one to care, to notice, to say. And no matter the resentment (for lack of a better word for what’s Rob’s feeling), this is wrong. Felipe would have his reasons, of course he would. Now Rob just has to find out what they were.

He turns, and almost runs to the motorhome.

*

Rob opens the door almost silently, not sure what he’s going to say yet. He can hear Felipe talking - on the phone perhaps? It doesn’t sound like anyone’s there. No, he’s talking to himself. He’s pacing, arguing with himself. No, he’s talking to _Rob_.

“ _I did not want you to know._ No, no, sounds bad. _I did not want to hurt you_. True, true, but, he would know in the end. _I did not want to admit it was true._ But it **is** true... _Did not want to be leaving you._ That is true, but, he will not miss you like that. Fuck! This is difficult... I should have told. _I should have told you._ ”

“Yes, you should.” Felipe spins around. Rob is leaning against the doorframe, arms folded, expression serious but remarkably calm. “So why didn’t you?” Rob clamps his mouth shut over the possible endings to that sentence, _I thought I was your friend, I thought I mattered, I deserved to know, what did you think I would say?_ They’ll all just hurt Felipe, and he looks guilty enough as it is. “Couldn’t you have, y’know, warned me, or something?” is what he settles on.

Felipe’s expression changes from cornered and worried to defeated acceptance.

“You would have kept me hoping.”

Well that wasn’t the reply Rob had expected.

“You would have told me it wasn’t true. That it couldn’t be true. You would have said I could change it, change their minds. And I would have believed you. I would have started to hope. But it was inevitable, no? You know it was. And...” Felipe stops, struggling for words for what will very obviously be an admission. Rob doesn’t like admissions - it means it’s something he’s missed, which is worse than just something that Felipe hasn’t told him. “I am glad to leave.” _Oh._ “I need to start again somewhere. This is not my team anymore, you know that.” Knowing and _knowing_ can be two very different things though.

“But, I...” Words fail Rob completely.

“You, yes you. You were fantastic. _Are_ fantastic. If it was just you, I would never leave.” Rob has seen too much of that sad, half smile on Felipe’s face for a lifetime, and it breaks Rob’s heart as much as the first time, _nearly two years ago now,_ he realises. “And you will be fantastic for someone else, no?”

“I don’t want to be anyone else’s.” Rob is vaguely aware that he sounds as petulant as his driver usually does. Felipe tries to smile, and it makes Rob irrationally angry; why should he have to be happy about any of this? It just isn’t _fair_.

“And I don’t want you to be. But you will be.”

“No I won’t.” Not like he’s been for Felipe, not anyone, not ever. He wasn’t just Felipe’s engineer, he was _Felipe’s_. And he says as much, almost before he can stop the words tumbling out, that Felipe had all of him, still has all of him, in ways that no one else ever did or ever will. His driver’s expression flickers, and Rob tries desperately to figure out if there’s something behind those dark eyes that hopes Rob’s saying everything he’s never said, and still isn’t quite saying... _Fuck it_ , _in for a penny..._ A half smile and a shrug, a deep breath, and the obvious translation of his aborted explanation. “I fucking love you Felipe.” _Shit_ , he really said it.

But Felipe looks stunned. _Really_ stunned. Then he starts to close the gap between them. And then he looks furious...

Rob finds himself shoved backwards, hard. The little Brazilian is suddenly all arms and fists as he hurls himself against his engineer.

“You _bastard_! All the time, you knew, and you didn’t tell me?! You knew! Why the _fuck_ didn’t you tell me?! Years and years and you knew, you knew...” Rob manages to grab his wrists and hold him still as the words start to deteriorate into Portuguese.

“Knew _what_?!”

“Everyone knows, why didn’t you tell me?!”

“Felipe...” Can he really? “Are you trying to tell me it’s not just me?”

Silence.

“You didn’t know?”

“No, Felipe, I didn’t know. I... I thought if, if anything, _you_ knew, and were just being dense... So I thought I just had to say...”

“Oh.”

Rob lets go of Felipe. “Oh indeed.” 

_Awkward_ doesn’t cut it right now.

“Since when?” Felipe doesn’t look at Rob as he asks, staring fixedly out of the motorhome window.

“Since the moment I met you. Well, seemed like it anyway.”

Felipe looks embarrassed. “Oh.”

“What about you?”

“Maybe a little after,” he shrugs.

More silence.

“Fuck.”

A sigh.

“I’m sorry Rob.”

“You’re right though, I would have tried to make you stay.”

“Or you would have said you would leave too, to follow me.”

Rob scoffs a laugh. “Yeah... yeah I would’ve, wouldn’t I? No point in suggesting it now then. Even though you just gave me every reason to try.”

“And you just gave me every reason to stay.”

Silence again.

“This,” Felipe gestures vaguely at nothing, “was not meant to go like this.”

“You don’t say...” Rob smiles grimly.

“No, you were meant to kiss me.” Felipe blushes madly at that admission, and Rob can’t help but laugh.

“You certainly weren't meant to try to punch me...”

“Sorry...” Felipe’s expression spins from dejected, to pensive, and into a mischievous and wide grin, just like Rob’s used to. “Maybe I could make it up to you?” Rob just raises an eyebrow. “I could kiss it better...”

 _Oh god_ , this is conflicting emotions galore, Rob’s responsible side going to war with the way his brain short-circuited at the mental images of what Felipe might actually be offering, a glorious reality of the shameful little fantasies Rob’s had all these years, and his head spins.

His sensible side wins out though. “Is that really the best idea? You’re leaving after all...”

Felipe’s face falls. “Exactly. Last chance, you know?”

“Guilting me into it won’t work, sunshine.” It’s meant to sound at least partly light-hearted, but in hindsight, now possibly isn’t the best time to be making jokes at the situation’s expense, and it’s pretty clear that it hits Felipe harder than it was meant to.

“That is not what I’m doing, Rob, I just...” Felipe’s voice wavers as for the first time in this whole conversation he looks genuinely upset. “I wanted to tell you at a good time, when you were proud of me, you understand? When we won our championship, but... Then I said ok, when I win my next race. And... So I thought just a podium, just that, but I... And then, I thought it was too late. I thought I’d missed my chance. That it had been too long.”

 _Same,_ thinks Rob. _When you were happy, but..._

This is ridiculous, why is he even _thinking_ of refusing?

“Oh, come ‘ere.” Rob reaches out and Felipe bundles himself into his engineer’s arms. There’s nothing new about that. Or about the kiss that Rob plants gently on the top of his head. What is new is the way Rob leans back slightly, and tucks his index finger under Felipe’s chin, tilting his head back so he’s looking up at Rob.

He could offer some useless platitudes, about always being there, about nothing standing in their way now, but hope is a fragile thing, and useless if it’s groundless - something Rob knows better than most.

“Let’s just, make the best of what we’ve got left then, ok?”

Felipe nods, slightly, Rob’s finger still in place. “Okay.”

And it’s then that Rob leans down to close the gap, and press his lips against Felipe’s.

The world doesn’t stop turning. Other people continue to exist. There’s no making up for six years of missed opportunities, and Felipe is still leaving at the end of the season. But for a few moments, they forget all that.

And maybe, just maybe, this isn’t actually the end for them. Maybe it’s the beginning.


End file.
